Nokia Drive 2.0, Reading, and Transport apps coming to Lumia range

By Tom Warren

Nokia is announcing two new Windows Phone apps and a Nokia Drive 2.0 update for its range of Lumia devices today at Mobile World Congress 2012. Nokia Drive 2.0 will be released on the Windows Phone Marketplace as a free update for existing Lumia devices and includes speed limit notifications, an advanced dashboard view, and offline capabilities. Windows Phone Nokia Drive users can now use the application offline, one of the biggest drawbacks to the original release, in the same way as existing Symbian users of Nokia Drive.

Nokia Reading, a brand new Windows Phone app for Lumia devices, will work as an integrated hub like the existing Nokia Music application. Reading will provide access to news, audiobooks, and ebooks in a digital magazine format, allowing users to simply add their own RSS feeds. Nokia has agreements with a number of online publications, and is planning to expand those in the future. Nokia plans to update the app with a news stream feature that allows Windows Phone users to pin news streams to the start screen with dynamic live tile updates.

The second new Windows Phone application today, Nokia Transport, is designed to help you with live public transport information and updates. Previously available on Symbian, the Windows Phone version adds support for journey pinning to the home screen and will support over 46 major cities worldwide at launch.